The Jesuit Role As “Experts” in High Qing Cartography and Technology∗

臺大歷史學報第31期 BIBLID1012-8514(2003)31p.223-250 2003年6月，頁223~250 2003.1.7收稿，2003.5.29通過刊登 The Jesuit Role as “Experts” in High Qing Cartography and Technology∗ Benjamin A. Elman∗∗ Abstract Earlier accounts have generally overvalued or undervalued the role of the Jesu- its in Ming-Qing intellectual life. In many cases the Jesuits were less relevant in the ongoing changes occurring in literati learning. In the medical field, for example, before the nineteenth century few Qing physicians (ruyi 儒醫) took early modern European “Galenic” medicine seriously as a threat to native remedies. On the other hand, the Kangxi revival of interest in mathematics was closely tied to the introduction of Jesuit algebra (jiegen fang 借根方), trigonometry (sanjiao xue 三角學), and logarithyms (duishu 對數). In the midst of the relatively “closed door” policies of the Yongzheng emperor and his successors, a large-scale effort to recover and collate the treasures of ancient Chinese mathematics were prioritized in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Despite setbacks during the early eighteenth century Rites Controversy, the Jesuits in China remained important “experts” (專家) in the Astro-Calendric Bureau (欽天監) and supervisors in the Qing dynasty’s imperial workshops. Earlier Adam Schall (1592-1666) and Ferdinand Verbiest (1623-1688) had not only championed the role of mathematics in Christianizing literati elites, but they also produced instruments and weapons at the behest of both the Ming and Qing dynasties. The technical expertise of the Jesuits in the China mission during the eighteenth century also ranged from translating Western texts and maps, introducing surveying methods to producing cannon, pulley systems, sundials, telescopes, water-pumps, musical instruments, clocks, and other mechanical devices. Their European enemies accused the Jesuits of making themselves useful to local rulers for their personal advantage rather than in the name of Christianity. Keywords: Jesuits, geography, experts, glass making, clocks, architecture. ∗ This article is part of a book project entitled “From the ‘Chinese Sciences’ (gezhi xue 格致學) to ‘Modern Science’ in China (kexue 科學), 1600-1900” to be published by Harvard University Press. ∗∗ Professor of East Asian Studies and History, Princeton University. 224 Benjamin A. Elman I. Mensuration and Cartography in the Eighteenth Century II. Cartography, Sino-Russian Relations, and Qing Imperial Interests III. The Jesuit Role in High Qing Arts, Instruments, and Technology IV. Final Comments Earlier accounts have generally overvalued or undervalued the role of the Jesuits in Ming-Qing intellectual life. In many cases the Jesuits were less relevant in the ongoing changes occurring in literati learning. In the medical field, for example, before the nineteenth century few Qing physicians (ruyi 儒醫) took early modern European “Galenic” medicine seriously as a threat to native remedies. Instead, most were determined to pierce the veil of Song metaphysical and cosmological systems that since the Jin and Yuan periods had been inscribed in the theory and practice of tradi- tional Chinese medicine. They sought to recapture the pristine meanings formulated in the medical classics of antiquity. They called into question the dominant framework of analysis, which Jin-Yuan-Ming physicians, following Song precedents, had enshrined as the theoretical norm in medical texts and casebooks.1 On the other hand, the Kangxi revival of interest in mathematics was closely tied to the introduction of Jesuit algebra (jiegen fang 借根方), trigonometry (sanjiao xue 三角學), and logarithyms (duishu 對數). As a result, Mei Juecheng 梅稼成(1681-1763) and others realized that they no 1 On the Song, see Asaf Goldschmidt, The Transformations of Chinese Medicine During the Northern Sung Dynasty (960-1126 A.D.): The Integration of Three Past Medical Approaches into a Comprehensive Medical System Following a Wave of Epidemics (Philadelphia: Uni- versity of Pennsylvania Ph.D. dissertation in the History and Sociology of Science, 1999). See also Chu Pingyi, “Tongguan Tianxue, Yixue yu Ruxue: Wang Honghan yu Ming-Qing Zhi Ji Zhongxi Yixue de Jiaohui” 通貫天學, 醫學與儒學:王宏翰與明清之際中西醫學的交會, Lishi yuyan yanjiu suo jikan 歷史語言研究所集刊 70. 1 (1999, Taiwan): 165-201, for an example of the impact of European medicine in the seventeenth century. The Jesuit Role as “Experts” in High Qing Cartography and Technology 225 longer had access to many of the works originally included in the medieval Ten Computational Classics (Shibu suanjing 十部算經). Moreover, in addition to the Sea Mirror of Circular Measurement (Ceyuan haijing 測圓海鏡) of 1248, which was the oldest extant work on the “single unknown” (tianyuan shu 天元術) technique for algebra, the seminal works of Song-Yuan literati mathematicians on polynomial algebra (siyuan shu 四元術) were unavailable in Mei Wending’s 梅文鼎 (1633-1721) time. In the midst of the relatively “closed door” policies of the Yongzheng emperor and his successors, a large-scale effort to recover and collate the treasures of ancient Chinese mathematics were prioritized in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. In addition to famous scholars such as Dai Zhen 戴震 (1724-1777), Qian Daxin 錢大昕 (1728-1804), Ruan Yuan 阮元 (1764-1849), and Jiao Xun 焦循 (1763-1820) who stressed mathematics in their research, the editing of ancient mathematical texts and the continued digesting of European mathematical knowledge was carried out by a series of literati mathematicians who were also active in evidential studies (kaozheng xue 考證學). Through the recovery and collation of ancient mathematical texts, the alleged superiority of Jesuit mathematics was increasingly disparaged by Qing scholars who appealed to the “Chinese ori- gins of Western Learning” (Xixue Zhongyuan 西學中源) as a historical reality and not just a political tactic to justify calendrical reform.2 Despite setbacks during the early eighteenth century Rites Controversy, the Jesuits in China remained important “experts” (專家) in the As- tro-Calendric Bureau (欽天監) and supervisors in the Qing dynasty’s imperial workshops. The technical expertise of the Jesuits in the China mission during the eighteenth century also ranged from translating Western texts and maps, introducing surveying methods to producing cannon, pulley systems, sundials, telescopes, water-pumps, musical instruments, clocks, and other mechanical devices. Their European enemies accused the Jesuits of 2 See my “Western Learning and Evidential Research in the Eighteenth Century,” Gugong jikan 故宮季刊(Taipei), forthcoming. 226 Benjamin A. Elman making themselves useful to local rulers for their personal advantage rather than in the name of Christianity. Adam Schall (1592-1666) and Ferdinand Verbiest (1623-1688) not only championed the role of mathematics in Christianizing literati elites, but they also produced instruments and weapons at the behest of both the Ming and Qing dynasties.3 While in Beijing, for example, the French Jesuits Michel Benoist and Jean-Joseph-Marie Amiot interested themselves in electricity. In 1755 they sent a report of their tests to St. Petersburg. Such experiments were kept secret. In 1773, Benoist demonstrated an air pump to the Qianlong emperor, who decided that the proper name for the device would be a “pipe to wait for the qi” (houqi tong 候氣筒), a reference to the perennial efforts by the Astro-Calendric Bureau to determine the onset of spring by measuring the qi emanating from the earth, which the Kangxi emperor had ridiculed early in his reign.4 In 1645, for instance, Schall had gone through the motions of submit- ting a report about the “waiting for the qi” (houqi 候氣) procedures used by the Bureau to determine the onset of spring within a fortnightly period, whose precise timing was one of the Bureau’s charges. “Waiting for the qi” was a technique for measuring the earth’s emanations that had changed over time. It had switched from a method to establish the correct dimensions of the musical pitch pipes, whose ratios were used for weights and measures, to one measuring the onset of the fortnightly periods. The procedures asso- ciated with “waiting for the qi” involved burying twelve musical pitch pipes of graduated lengths in a sealed chamber and filling the pipes with ashes 3 Li Bin 李斌, “Xishi wuqi dui Qingchu zuozhan fangfa de yingxiang” 西式武器對清初作戰方法的影響 (The impact of Western style weapons on combat techniques in the early Qing), Ziran bianzheng fa tongxun 自然辯證法通訊 24. 4 (2002): 45-53. 4 J. L. Heilbron, Electricity in the 17th and 18th Centuries: A Study of Early Modern Physics (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979), 121, 352, 405. See also Joseph Needham and others, Science and Civilisation in China (Multi-volumes. Cambridge: Cambridge Uni- versity Press, 1954-), hereafter SCC, Volume 3, 450-451. Compare Stephen Shapin and Simon Schaffer, Leviathan and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle, and the Experimental Life (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989). The Jesuit Role as “Experts” in High Qing Cartography and Technology 227 produced by burning the pith of a reed. In antiquity it had been believed that when the sun entered the second fortnight of any month, the earth’s qi as a seminal force would rise and expel the ashes from the pipes.5 When Yang Guangxian 楊光先 (1597-1669) brought his famous 1664 suit against the Jesuits, their attitude toward “waiting for the qi” as a means to determine auspicious dates (吉凶= “hemerology”) became a focus of Yang’s attacks. Yang accused Schall of relying on his own

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